


The Persistence of Memory

by PazithiGallifreya



Series: Writing the Future [1]
Category: Back to the Future (Movies)
Genre: Don't copy to another site, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:07:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24501340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PazithiGallifreya/pseuds/PazithiGallifreya
Summary: Everything worked out in the end, didn't it? Marty's family was perfect now, Doc had gotten his happy ending with Clara, and life went on.So why did everything feel so wrong?
Relationships: Emmett "Doc" Brown & Marty McFly, Emmett "Doc" Brown/Clara Clayton
Series: Writing the Future [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1803457
Comments: 10
Kudos: 48





	The Persistence of Memory

**Author's Note:**

> This story is based on the movies alone. I haven't read the comics or played the game, and I haven't seen the cartoon since it originally aired as Saturday morning cereal munching fare and can't say I remember anything about it, so, uh, that's that I guess.
> 
> Also: one content warning for mention of marijuana use by background characters

Everything worked out in the end, didn't it? Jennifer walked alongside Marty, her arms swinging gently, a bemused half-smile on her face. They said nothing much until they arrived back at her front porch, and if Marty held her a little tighter when he kissed her goodbye, it didn't mean anything in particular. He'd had a wild week, hadn't he? Even if everything had worked out in the end.

Marty meant to go straight home, of course, and if his feet strayed to another part of town, well, he was bound to be a little absent-minded after everything that had happened, wasn't he? He pulled the mail from the dented mailbox as he passed it. It was the usual mix of bills, scientific journals, and advertisement fliers for the local supermarket. The key was under the door mat, as always, and he let himself into the garage, half-expecting the barking and galloping paws of Einstein rushing up to greet him, but, no – Doc came back and took Einstein with him. He'd wanted his dog back, that was understandable. Einstein was a great dog, and Doc's got two kids now who could use a pet. Kids need pets, Marty thought. He'd never had a pet of his own as a kid. His mother was always too drunk to care and his dad had always said he didn't have the time to look after an animal, with all of his work, and that he wouldn't trust Marty and his siblings to look after a dog on their own, and anyway money was tight and veterinary bills could be expensive. But Marty had fed and walked Einstein for Doc from the time the dog was a puppy and it was pretty much like having his own dog. He'd been spending more time at Doc's place than at home for a long time, after all.

Marty flopped down on the old threadbare armchair, laying the photograph from 1885 that Doc had handed to him in his lap. The clocks scattered about the home still ticked away. There were a few items missing from the workbench and the shelves, along with Einstein's absence, he noticed, but most of Doc's experimental detritus lay where he'd left it, unimportant and abandoned. Motes of dust danced in the late afternoon sunlight streaming in from the windows high on the wall, kicked up by Marty's sudden disturbance of the place. Marty scrubbed a hand over his face, pinching the bridge of his nose and grimacing for a moment as he tried to wrap his head around everything that had happened. He got up, setting the photograph down in the seat behind him carefully, and crossed the room to a shelf where he knew a cardboard box held all the keys, and spent the rest of the afternoon winding and setting clocks.

* * *

“Dave will be home sometime this afternoon, Marty, could you park your truck on the street? He'll need the spot in the garage to unpack.”

Marty blinked for a moment, trying to parse what his mother had said. It had been a week since he'd returned to his present (well, _a_ present, anyway), but some things still took him off-guard. “Uh, r-right. I'll get it moved before lunch, I promise.”

His brother Dave was attending a business school somewhere, these days. Dave had a part-time job in an office somewhere a couple days a week as well. Burger King was just a cheap fast-food joint near Doc's place where they occasionally hit the drive-through when things were too busy to fix dinner. His parents actually cooked now. _Cooked_. Even his father spent time in the kitchen, or out in the backyard at the grill when the weather allowed, his signature chili dogs apparently being a great hit with the family. Being a writer allowed his time to be somewhat flexible, it seemed. And his mother had a part time job, some officey thing that didn't sound terribly exciting, but afforded her an income of her own, which did not get spent on vodka.

Everything was better. The memories of his childhood were nothing but a bad dream, now. His mother never stumbled through the house drunk, swearing at anyone who crossed her line of sight. Biff Tannen never shoved his way into the home, deliberately breaking things while his father cowered somewhere. Linda spent her days at a boutique in town, selling expensive handbags and accessories to people with more money than sense, and bringing home a tidy income from her commissions, instead of hiding in her bedroom behind a locked door.

Marty was happy for them. Truly, he was. He couldn't have engineered a better ending for his family if he'd tried. Everything had worked out in the end, hadn't it?

* * *

The rest of the school year seemed to pass by in a flash, the days peeling away as though he'd been speeding off in the Delorean. He recognized the faces of his classmates, but there was something foriegn in how they looked at him now. He wasn't exactly popular, but neither was he a favored target for bullies anymore. The boys who had spent years giving him hell had settled on easier targets in this version of the present. That was better, right? Wasn't it? One afternoon, Marty walked out to his truck in the parking lot just in time to witness some freshman kid being thrown head-first into the dumpsters behind the cafeteria. That used to be me, he thought. Except, not really. Not anymore. _That_ never _happened to me. Not_ this _me_.

Marty shook his head and climbed into his truck as the pack of bullies had sauntered off laughing. I should have done something, he thought. He'd stood up to Biff Tannen in 1955, after all. But he wasn't that kid anymore. Not in this timeline. _I remember those dumpsters, how I'd stink the rest of the day after._ Don't let yourself be provoked, he reminded himself. _You aren't like that anymore. You aren't going to get canned in thirty years because Needles called you a chicken and you reacted the same way at forty-seven years old as you did at ten years old._

Marty cranked the truck and listened to the engine rumble while he waited for Jennifer to arrive. They planned to spend the afternoon studying (and, later, _not_ studying). He stared out of the window, watching the freshman climb out of the cafeteria dumpster, shaking spent ketchup packets out of his hair. I'll do something next time, Marty thought. _I'll definitely do something next time_.

* * *

“It's okay to take a gap year, but you really should have some sort of long-term plans worked out by now, son.”

“Yeah, I know, dad. I just mailed out the demo tapes last week, they'll hardly have had time to even listen to it yet. I'm sure I'll get a response by the end of the year, though.”

Marty's father reached for the salt shaker, applying it liberally over his plate while he shook his head in disapproval. Marty bit back a retort he knew would only be satisfying for a brief moment and cause more trouble than it would be worth. This was a tired conversation already, and it was only the second week of July. His siblings were both elsewhere this evening, leaving Marty to be the center of his parents' attention at the dinner table.

“You should get a degree of some sort, or at least a certificate in something if you don't want to spend that much time at college. Your mother and I would be happy to help you with tuition, you know. There's got to be _something_ you're interested in besides rock'n'roll, or that you'd at least find helpful? Dave's business degree he's working toward, for example-”

“I'm not Dave, Dad. And Linda's done alright with just a diploma-”

“Linda has done alright, yes. And I'm proud of her, Marty, don't mistake me on that, she works hard. But Linda never had your head for school work, you're a bright kid, and you shouldn't waste your potential, that's all I'm saying! And popular music is very hard industry to crack. For every guitar player that ends up on the cover of Rolling Stone, there are hundreds who end up nowhere, you need to have a fall-back plan. What about all that time you've been spending with Doctor Brown? I know he's... unconventional... but you have to have learned something about science in the last couple of years? Or you could get a degree in teaching, and still study music, become a school marching band director or something-”

Marty rolled his eyes, pushing a congealing pile of buttered peas around his plate. I literally re-wrote history, he thought, and now I have to think about college? Marty's band were doing alright, in his opinion, considering everything. The weekend after he'd come home, he'd met up with them at their drummer's house on Saturday afternoon, arriving late and finding them playing their way through a set of tunes he didn't even recognize. He'd panicked for a moment, but had the presence of mind to suggest a few well-worn covers “for practice.” Thankfully, they were covers this timeline's version of his band had also known and had played in the past. Paul, the bass player, had rolled his eyes and complained, but Marty had managed to play-act enough to convince them that he'd decided on a new direction for the band and that he had better stuff coming up for them than the old set. He'd had to rush the following couple of weeks to finish up some songs he'd been working on before he'd travelled through time, and he'd been lucky that the band had really gotten into them. Lee, the keyboardist, had managed to get hold of some decent recording equipment from a local pawn shop for cheap, and their first demo tape had been wrapped up by graduation. None of them had questioned Marty any further about their older songs, the ones he'd never heard before, much less played. Everything worked out in the end, didn't it?

Marty ate a few more bites of his mashed potatoes and stood up, excusing himself. He took his plate into the kitchen to rinse off before putting it in the dishwasher. _We never had a dishwasher in the other timeline. Couldn't afford it. I always had to wash the dishes by hand, Linda usually made sure she disappeared before everyone else finished eating, and who even knew where Dave was half the time._ Shaking his head, Marty ran a hand through his hair, staring out of the window at the fading evening sunlight for a moment. He glanced at his parents over his shoulder, who were whispering to each other over their plates. He could just about guess what the topic was, but was in no mood to discuss it anymore. “I'm gonna head over to Doc's tonight. Want to work on something.”

Marty's mother looked up, a slight delay in her response. “Alright, sweetheart, but if you stay past midnight, just crash on his couch until morning. I don't want you out on the roads at the same time as all the drunks.”

* * *

Marty parked his truck on the street and pulled a stack of mail from the mailbox as he passed it. He pulled his ring of keys out from his pocket to unlock the door. He didn't bother hiding it under the front mat anymore. He sat down at Doc's old kitchen table and went through the mail, pulling out the bills and writing out checks for the water, insurance, and electricity from an account he'd opened just after his eighteenth birthday. The Pinheads had done well for themselves in recent months, playing gigs around town. They'd started doing anything they could, from wedding receptions and bar mitzvahs to real gigs at a couple local clubs. They'd managed a regular enough schedule to keep up a steady, if modest, income for the four of them. They'd even ventured out to some of the bigger cities a few times, building up a small following and making their name known.

Marty had dropped the demo tapes in the mail a week ago and left it to its fate. He ought to be nervous, or excited, or something, but in truth he hadn't thought much about it until his father had decided to grill him over dinner. Marty's father might not think much of his career choice, but Marty thought he was being a bit of a hypocrite, really. Writing fiction is hardly a sure thing, either, and the George McFly in this timeline had apparently spent years writing for a local newspaper (if the framed clippings in his office told anything) to make ends meet before getting published. He'd told Marty he could do anything he set his mind to, and yet also frequently pestered him about returning to school. _He just worries about you_ , Marty's own mind unhelpfully provided. In all fairness, his father had supported him in his own way, coming home just a few days ago with a bag full of guitar strings and spare picks. The old George McFly had never taken much interest in Marty's future plans. He'd been too busy doing Biff Tannen's grunt work and fretting over everything to even notice Marty half the time, and his mother... well, the less said the better, really. Everything worked out in the end, though, right? His life was good here, even if he didn't remember the majority of it, even if he lived with a family who were kind to him, but also strangers, even if he hadn't seen his best and oldest friend in months and may never see him again. Everything worked out in the end, didn't it? _It's all fine. Everything's fine_.

Marty walked about the garage, winding up the collection of antique clocks. Afterward, he picked up the old acoustic guitar that Doc had inexplicably propped in a forgotten corner many years ago. It always took a few minutes to get it tuned, but it didn't sound half bad. The rest of the evening passed with his quiet strumming in the old armchair, accompanied by the ticking of the clocks.

* * *

September arrived with autumn thunderstorms, some of them quite dramatic. The trees of Hill Valley bore the brunt of the lightning's wrath this time, rather than the town hall's clock, but the sound of thunder still had Marty's mind straying back to 1955, and everything that followed. Doc had not returned from 1885, and Marty no longer expected to hear Einstein's barking when went by the garage anymore. Doc had a wife and two sons, and his old dog, and wherever, _whenever_ they were, Marty was sure they were happy, and Marty was happy for them, for his best friend, that he'd found the family he'd always wanted. _The family he'd always wanted, without_ you _in it_. Marty shook his head, pushing the unbidden thought away, but the itchy, ungrateful feeling still crawled over the back of his neck. _I_ should _be happy for them. I am! Really, I am. Everything worked out in the end, didn't it?_

Marty's band had finished several back-to-back gigs at clubs over in Los Angeles and he'd come back home for a couple weeks' break. Jennifer had packed up and gone to college the week before, though, which left him with little to do in his spare time, although tried to call her as often as he could. He was definitely happy for her, though, even if he also missed her. He'd see Jennifer again, that wasn't in question – fall break wasn't all that far away, really. The scholarship she'd gotten was a good one, and highly competitive. Her tuition was fully paid for and her future seemed a lot more certain than his at the moment.

Marty hadn't been that anxious about the mix tape for most of the summer, but now that fall had arrived, he was beginning to notice the lack of response. Had the post office lost all the envelopes somewhere? Did it even make it to the offices of the record labels? He was tempted to try and call, but he wasn't even sure where to look up the numbers, and didn't want to come across as pushy or desperate, either.

Marty rolled out of bed and picked up a random t-shirt off the floor. He gave it a quick sniff test and, deeming it acceptable, pulled it on and headed toward the kitchen. It was earlier than he normally rose, but the coffee pot was already half-empty. His father had recently begun working on a new novel, spending most of his time crouched over the fancy brand-new Compaq 386 personal computer he'd bought himself for a small fortune along with the latest word processing software and a new dot-matrix printer. Author George McFly's old typewriter was now relegated to the top shelf of the closet, collecting dust.

Marty could hear the clacking of the keyboard from the kitchen table as he sat down with his coffee and a couple of strawberry pop-tarts. He'd go over to Doc's garage later, he thought, and work on a couple of songs he'd been trying to hash out for the band. They needed more material, if they were going to record a whole album. We _are_ going to record a whole album, he thought emphatically, even if part of his mind wondered if they'd ever hear back from any of the record companies. They had a good thing going, and the record executives had to see that, didn't they?

The clacking of the computer keyboard ceased and George McFly materialized in the doorway. Marty glanced up, nodding slightly in acknowledgment as his father headed toward the kitchen to refill his coffee mug. He expected his father to retreat back to his computer, but he sat down across from Marty at the table instead, stirring sugar into his mug.

“Marty...” He hesitated and Marty bit into his pop-tart, already feeling slightly on edge at whatever conversation was impending. “Listen, son, I've been a little worried about you lately, are you doing alright?”

Marty swallowed the bite of pop-tart like a lump of concrete, and washed it down with coffee. “Yeah, dad, I'm fine. The band's doing great, we had four shows in L.A. last week! I'm tired but we're great, really.”

George shook his head at his son. “I'm glad your music is coming along, but that's not what I mean. The last few months, your mother and I have noticed you seem a bit, ah, distant? I know you're at that age when you want to get away from your family, but if something's going on, I want you to know you can always talk to us.”

Marty stared down at his plate for a moment, then looked askance at his father, feeling an odd little nugget of guilt settling in his stomach. _Can I talk to you, really? Would you even believe me if I'd told you the truth?_ “I know, dad. I've just been busy with the band, and with Jennifer when she's in town. Everything's fine, really. I'm sure we'll hear back from one of the record labels soon.”

Marty shrank slightly under the shrewd gaze of his father. George McFly might have been a bit of a space case, but Marty knew his father wasn't actually stupid – far from it, in fact. _Does he suspect..._? He couldn't, really. George McFly clearly knew his son had changed, but Marty couldn't fathom how his father could know even a fraction of the truth, of just how much his son had changed. _I'm not the Marty you knew at all, am I? I don't even remember my childhood here._ Maybe some of it was the same, but it couldn't have been that similar, really. Could his father make the connection between Marty and “Calvin Kleine” who visited his school one week thirty years ago? Marty gave his father a smile he hoped was convincing, then drank down the rest of his coffee so he'd have an excuse to stand up and get away from him for a minute as he retreated to the kitchen for his own refill.

* * *

Marty swore as another string on the old Martin acoustic in Doc's garage snapped. He'd almost worked out the bridge for this song, at least. He rolled to his feet and set the guitar in the armchair, and took a moment to stretch, letting his shoulders pop satisfyingly after sitting for hours. He remembered some spare strings out in the truck, and went out to retrieve them. He pulled them out of a shopping bag behind the driver's seat and walked around the back to stand for a moment. He needed a breather, anyway.

There was an empty field behind Doc's garage, where the house he'd inherited from his parents once stood before it burned to the ground some time in the sixties. People in town had said he'd done it on purpose, for the insurance money, but Doc had told him it was an accident shortly after they met and befriended one another, and Marty had believed him. Doc hadn't rebuilt the house, instead using some of the money to add a small kitchen and a bathroom to the free-standing garage that had been spared the flames, and had carried on.

A flash and a bang were all that heralded the return of Doctor Emmett L. Brown. Rather anticlimactic, really, but Marty dropped the guitar strings in the dirt and ran toward the steam locomotive, laughing for the first time in months.

* * *

The whole family was crowded around Doc's small kitchenette table. Jules and Verne, now twelve and ten years old, respectively, peppered Marty with questions about the Delorean and Marty's adventures with their father in 1955 and 2015. Marty felt slightly dizzy at the attention but tried to answer as well as he could.

“Why don't you boys give Marty a break and go help your mother?” Doc sat down in the seat vacated by Jules and motioned Marty into Verne's empty chair as the boys ran out of the back door to help Clara with some luggage. Doc looked at Marty for a long beat, as though searching for something in his face. “How are you, Marty?”

Marty shrugged at his best friend. “Alright. My band's been doing well, we've had gigs in Los Angeles recently. Sent a demo tape to a few labels, still hoping to hear back from one of them eventually.”

“Good, good... and your family?”

Marty scratched at the back of his neck, even more unsure of how to answer that one. On the face of it, it was simple, so he gave the simple answer. “They're fine. Dave didn't drop out of school in... in this timeline. Linda's got a job and friends. My dad's working on his next big novel, and my mother's not an angry alcoholic. It's... it's like paradise. I never would have guessed they're the same people, if they didn't have the same faces, you know? Everything worked out in the end.”

Instead of nodding like Marty expected, Doc's eyes narrowed slightly as he hummed to himself. “You've settled in, then? No problems adjusting?”

“I'm fine doc, really, it's like living in a dream...”

Clara and the children returned at that moment, the door slamming back as Jules and Verne rushed in. “Boys, don't slam doors, I've told you a thousand--” Clara paused as she caught sight of Marty and her husband sitting at the table. Something in their expressions must have been off, and she and Doc exchanged some kind of look whose meaning was lost on Marty, but clearly held significance to the two of them. A moment later, Clara smiled and nodded toward the stove. “Come help me with these newfangled appliances, Emmett. You and Marty will have plenty of time to catch up after we have supper.”

Marty let himself be dragged outside by Jules and Verne and spent the next hour and a half trying to teach them how to use a skateboard, until Doc's voice rang through the autumn air calling them in to eat.

* * *

Marty stood in silence next to Doc after supper, bumping shoulders as he washed dishes next to his oldest friend, who was drying and stacking them up. Clara poked her head around the corner to let Doc know she was taking the boys back to the train to put them to bed (there simply wasn't room in the garage). Finished with the chore, Marty rinsed the dish soap from his hands under the hot water one last time before shutting the tap off. The noise and bustle of Jules and Verne being herded out of the back door (under much protest) died away and Marty was left with the sound of the ticking clocks and Doc's soft breathing near his shoulder.

Marty remained standing, his hands braced on the edge of the sink, unsure in this moment what the hell he was doing, or why. It had been a very common sensation in the first weeks after his return, but somewhat less so as months passed, but now it returned like a sudden punch to the jaw. Marty felt his throat tighten. Doc laid a hand on his shoulder, gentle but insistent, pulling him back to sit at the table.

“Marty, I must admit, I had intended to check up on you after we returned, but I did not expect you to be _here_ , ah... not that I mind you keeping the place up, but it seems like a strange thing for a young man to be doing?”

Marty shrugged. “I just needed somewhere quiet, I guess. And I hated to think of something bad happening to your lab, and figured if it looked like it was still lived in, maybe kids wouldn't try to break in.”

“Hmm, you may be right. It isn't something I would have asked you to do, though.” Doc glanced around. “Did you also pay for the utilities, then?”

“Yeah, and the insurance. I mean I've been using it, and I have money from the band, so it wasn't a big deal. I hope you aren't mad, I know you didn't exactly tell me I could hang out here while you were gone, but-”

Doc held up a placating hand. “No, Marty, I'm not angry. I suppose I just expected you'd lose interest in... well, in Hill Valley as well as this old place. You've been talking about your plans for The Pinheads since you were fifteen, it was one of the first things you told me about yourself as I recall--”

“The Pinheads are important Doc, but... wait, Doc, what do you mean, 'one of the first things' I told you... I didn't start the Pinheads until I was fourteen, I couldn't have told you when we first...” Marty bent over the table, massaging at his head as a sharp pain hit him between the eyes. When he looked up again, Doc was staring across the table at him, eyes wide like Marty had just said something vulgar. Doc briefly glanced past Marty at something over his shoulder but returned to meet Marty's pained gaze.

“I, uh... offered you a job as a lab assistant and dog walker just after you turned fifteen, as I recall it, you spent half the evening telling me about your future plans to be a rock star while I was working on the flux capacitor prototype... I suppose now you're going to tell me you remember something different, aren't you?”

Marty stared back at Doc, his own expression resembling something like a beached fish now. He'd been stumbling along for months, now, surrounded by a family he barely knew and holding onto what was still familiar – Jennifer, his music, this damned garage, and the knowledge that his best and oldest friend was out there somewhere, safe and happy and alive. That was all still true, though, wasn't it? Marty stared at the man sitting across from him. He swallowed thickly and turned away, unable to think of anything to say. “Heavy...”

Marty shoved the spindly chair back and stumbled to his feet. Doc stood up as well, following him, his brow creased with slight worry. Marty held up a hand to stall him, shaking his head. “You know what, Doc? Don't worry about it. If that's what you remember, then that's what happened, alright? Everything's fine.” Marty turned around and headed toward the back door, startling slightly when he saw Clara standing there with a worried expression. Marty briefly panicked, thinking she was going to stop him from leaving, but she stepped aside and held the door for him, her hand brushing lightly against his shoulder as he escaped into the cool night air. Soft voices floated out behind him before the door closed. “ _I'll go talk to him, Clara.” “Give the boy a moment, Emmett..._ ”

* * *

It was early enough in the fall that it wasn't cold yet, especially here in California where summer often wore on well past August. Mosquitoes buzzed around his head and he halfheartedly swatted at them, not really caring at the moment if he got bitten or not. He ought to just leave, he thought. He'd left the acoustic guitar inside, but he could retrieve it later. Or not. It was Doc's guitar, technically, even if Marty was the only one who ever used it. Everything inside was Doc's.

There was enough light from the city reflecting off the cloudy sky for Marty to see his watch. It was past eleven o'clock and he was still sitting on an old crate in Doc's back yard, staring at the impossibility that was a time-travelling steam locomotive and wondering where the hell his own life went completely off the rails. It was easy to pin the blame on Doc and his Delorean, but he knew it was as much his own damned fault as Doc's. Doc didn't make him push his teenaged father-to-be out of the way of his grandfather's car, or tell Doc about the Libyan terrorists. Doc didn't make him buy that sports almanac, either, or make him go back to 1885 because of an old tombstone that was really none of his business. The terrorists and the tombstone he couldn't feel too terrible over, though. He'd had to save his best friend. He'd _had_ to. The memory of Doc laying in the parking lot of Twin Pines Mall with a dark stain swiftly spreading out beneath him while Marty ran like a damned chicken still haunted him. Doc had told him to run, but it didn't make him feel any less of a coward.

Marty flinched slightly when a warm hand landed on his shoulder. He glanced up, finding the silhouette of Clara leaning over him. “Uh...”

“It's alright, Marty. I understand if this is all difficult for you. It certainly took me a while to come to terms with the fact that I'm meant to be dead, you know? Emmett goes on about thinking fourth-dimensionally and that works very fine for him, but we don't all think about things the same way he does, do we?”

Marty squinted, trying to make out Clara's face in the dim light, but gave up after a moment. “I, uh, suppose not, ma'am.”

“You may call me Clara, Marty. You're family, you know. Why don't you come back inside? The mosquitoes are quite the plague tonight it seems!”

Marty shuddered, hunching over on himself again. Was he family, like she said? He didn't remember things the way Doc described at all. He felt his stomach clench and stood up. Clara took his movement for acquiescence and turned back toward the garage. Marty reluctantly followed.

* * *

It was late and Marty was exhausted. He'd meant to call Jennifer tonight but she was probably asleep now and miffed with him for forgetting. He'd try to make it up to her later. Marty sank back into the cushions of the armchair eyeing the acoustic guitar where Doc had propped it up against the arm of the ancient sofa where he sat with his wife, her hand clasped in his as if out of long habit.

“Marty, if you... if you need to talk, I'm here. We both are. You know that right?”

Marty shifted uncomfortably. “Hm. Why exactly _are_ you here, Doc? You never did say why you came back.” Marty's eyes fell to the bissfully married couple's clasped hands, watching Doc's thumb rubbing idly over the back of his wife's much smaller hand. _At least_ they're _happy_.

“We, ah, made a stop in 2050 to see a doctor about something. I decided to return here afterward. We left a few months' gap so we could use the story that I went traveling for a bit, and married a widow with two children. I was hoping it wouldn't be too wildly unbelievable...”

Marty latched onto the mention of a doctor. “You're sick?”

“No, Marty, I'm fine. We're all fine, now. Verne's treatment was successful, thankfully. But the medication he will need for the foreseeable future cannot be found in the 19th century. It is, however, commonly available in 1985 and this is a more familiar environment than 2050. I didn't want to risk going back and forth endlessly, as the medication has a shelf life and cannot simply be stockpiled.”

“Oh. Well, that makes sense, I suppose.”

Doc chuckled but there was a brittleness to his humor that put Marty slightly on edge. “I'm glad you approve, Marty. But I did notice you didn't answer my question. It wasn't meant to be rhetorical.”

“Doc, I... appreciate your offer, but really, I'll be alright. It's just a lot to take in sometimes, even though it's been months.”

“What is, Marty?”

Marty cocked an eyebrow in question. “What is _what_? A lot to take in? Oh, I don't know, re-writing history, maybe? It's not the way most people spend their senior year of high school, you know. Sometimes things just feel weird, alright? I can deal with it, it's just heavy sometimes.” Marty's voice rose as he spoke, ending on an embarrassingly high pitch and he crossed his arms over his chest, feeling like he'd been stripped naked. “You know, it's getting late. I should probably go home, we can talk tomorrow.”

Marty stood suddenly and started gathering up some of his things while Clara and Doc tried to convince him it would be safer to just spend the night, but Marty's head buzzed with too many confusing thoughts and Doc's garage was suddenly far too crowded. Marty pulled his jacket on as he headed to the front door. “I'll, uh, swing by tomorrow, Doc. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine, I always am, right?” He gave his friend a watery smile and fled into the night.

* * *

The rest of the week passed and Marty did not, in fact, go back by Doc's place. He couldn't quite formulate the emotions roiling in the back of his head into anything understandable, and being confronted with Doc, Clara, and the kids threatened to open something in him he wasn't sure he could close back up. His father asked him about his friend and Marty shrugged, saying Doc was busy with some intense project and needed to work alone for a while. He wasn't quite ready to bring up Clara, Jules, and Verne, it would require him to spin more lies than he already had, and he just didn't have the stomach for it.

The Pinheads had a few gigs around town coming up, and he spent his Saturday and Sunday rehearsing in the garage of their drummer. At least his bandmates seemed mostly unchanged, and he could still joke with them without feeling like a complete interloper. It was on stage that he felt most alive these days, the only time where he felt like himself fully and completely, and he threw himself into his work. He finished one of his new songs Saturday afternoon and introduced it to the band during rehearsal. They were just really getting it down by the time they needed to pack their gear up for their gig at a wedding reception on Saturday night. Unfortunately they only played covers from a list provided by the bride, but it went off without hitch and the pay was decent, even if playing covers had mostly lost their appeal some time ago. The club gig the next day started well, but by the end grew into more of a frustration, as Marty broke two guitar strings and his voice was off as his fall allergies were kicking up.

Their next gig wasn't until Friday, leaving Marty with some time on his hands. He called Jennifer daily, but with her school work really cranking up now, her free time was becoming rather more limited and their conversations briefer. He missed her terribly, but he couldn't bring himself to resent her for leaving for college.

Feeling antsy, Marty put down his guitar and dug out his skateboard out from under his bed. The pickup truck his parents had given him had largely replaced it as his primary means of transportation, but sometimes he just needed to get out and feel the wind in his hair. He took a circuitous path through town, taking back roads through the neighborhoods, stopping in the library to use their restroom and water fountain. He paused briefly in front of city hall, looking up at the frozen clock that had stopped on that strange night in 1955. He dropped his skateboard back to the pavement and pushed off, putting its mocking face behind him.

He spent the afternoon rolling aimlessly, until he found himself almost against his will in front of Doc's place. The garage and a stand of trees hid the steam locomotive from view, but he knew if he jumped the fence or went through to the back door, it would still be there. He was about to turn around and head home when the voices of Jules and Verne Brown called out to him. “Hey, Marty! Where have you been? Dad's been waiting for you for days!”

Marty turned around, seeing their faces peering at him through the chain link fence. “Oh, uh, hey boys! I've uh, been around. Just, y'know, busy. With my band and, um, stuff...”

Verne shoved at his brother to get a better look at Marty. “Well you'd better come on in, mom's making us lemonade!”

Marty hesitated, picking up his skateboard and tucking it under one elbow. It was still hot out and he'd already sweated through his t-shirt. Something to drink was tempting, but it also meant he'd have to face Doc. The boys went up to the door and looked back at Marty, expectation clearly written on their faces. Marty sighed deeply and followed them inside.

* * *

“It's good to see you, Marty!” Clara was cheerful as she brought out the tray with tall glasses full of ice and a pitcher full of real lemonade with a few stray seeds lurking in the bottom. “Let me get another glass. I'm glad the boys invited you in, Emmett's been looking for you, you know.”

Marty didn't miss the sharp look Clara gave him with that last statement, but accepted the cold lemonade gratefully, drinking down half the glass in one go. Clara topped his glass back up without comment as Doc plopped down the chair across from him. The boys took their glasses and sat on the sofa nearby, slurping happily. The five of them enjoyed their treat in silence for a few minutes, which Marty was grateful for. His shirt was still sticking to his back uncomfortably but he'd started to cool down some, in more ways than one. He could feel a tightness across his cheeks that heralded a slight sunburn and mentally noted to bring a hat next time he wandered out for nearly an entire day.

After the pitcher was empty, Clara cleared the table and ushered the boys back outside with the promise that Marty might play with them later, if they asked him nicely. Doc leaned back in his chair, the gears in the scientist's head turning for a moment while Marty squirmed like a kid sitting in the principal's office. “Marty, I've known you for... what is it, about three years give or take? Plus that week you visited 1955. I know you well enough to know something is bothering you. I can guess what it is, but I'd rather you just told me. I do feel, ah, responsible, you know. Give me a chance to make things right at least?”

Marty looked up and across at Doc. He looked both hopeful and nervous at the same time and for the first time Marty took a moment to try and see it from Doc's perspective. There's so much you just don't know, he thought. But was it really fair to blame him for it? Marty was tempted, again, to just push Doc's concerns aside. It really wasn't his fault. It was the fault of... well, that was complicated, wasn't it? All the last few months' memories descended on Marty, every deflection and lie he'd used to avoid making his family suspicious, every stilted conversation with classmates who had known him for years and yet not at all, all the anxieties and lies still sitting like a lump of lead in his guts.

“Three years, Doc? That's all?” Marty shook his head, wishing he still had the glass of lemonade so he'd at least have something solid to hold onto. Clara walked past, gripping her husband's shoulder in passing before heading to the other side of the garage to busy herself with some unnecessary bit of tidying.

“Marty, that's what I remember. It's obvious now that you remember something different. You could tell me if you want. I don't know that I can fix this, not without creating bigger problems, what with the space-time continuum, but... I _want_ to know, Marty.”

Marty hunched over the table, trying and failing not to fidget terribly. “I was ten, Doc. Not fifteen. _Ten_. Three days before my eleventh birthday, actually. I was in a shitty mood because my parents had told me they couldn't afford to do anything for my birthday that year, even though Linda had gotten a rollerskating party and Dave went bowling with his friends for his. It was right when my mom had _really_ started drinking heavily, and I knew she'd probably spent all the extra money on liquor, so I was pissed off at her. I'd sneaked out of the house after dark and ran into Needles and his gang on the way to the park, and we started walking around the neighborhood because I said I didn't want to go home. We ended up over here and Needles decided to be an asshole, going on about how you used kids for science experiments, trying to scare me, and then he dared me to climb over the fence to prove I wasn't chicken.”

Marty paused, scratching at his scalp. His memories of that night that were still so vivid, it was hard to accept that it technically had never happened. “I don't think you were too happy when I got my jacket caught on the fence and you found me hanging there halfway choking to death. The other boys had run off as soon as you opened the door and I thought I was going to end up as a lab rat, but you just pulled me down from the fence and asked me what I was doing. You tried to call my parents to come get me, but my dad was out of town working on some stupid thing Biff made him do and my mom was probably already passed out drunk. I spent the night on your sofa and walked home the next morning. None of them had even noticed I'd left. My mother chewed me out but forgot about it by the next day.”

Doc nodded, humming slightly to himself, but apparently had nothing to add. There was no spark of recognition, and while Marty hadn't been expecting anything, he still ended up feeling disappointed. “Doc... if it hadn't been for you, I don't know what I would have done all those years. You let me spend time over here and while I never really said exactly what was going on with my family, I think somehow you knew how crappy it all was. You let me help you with your experiments and explained everything like you expected me to understand. You didn't talk to me like I was just some dumb useless kid getting in the way all the time like they did at home... Shit, you have no idea what that meant to me back then, do you?”

Doc huffed, staring at some imaginary point in the mid distance, then shook his head, his white hair flying about wildly. “I'm sorry, Marty, I really am. I just... It's true, I don't remember any of that. For me, you were fifteen, and I ran into you with your family at the Burger King across the street there. You wanted something or another your parents wouldn't buy you, and I offered you work. I knew who you were, mind – I remembered you from 1955, and all that you had told me. I still had your note that I'd taped back together, you know, and it's a good thing I changed my mind about it.” Doc glanced at Clara, who was pretending to dust some of Doc's electronic bits and pieces on a shelf across the room as though she wasn't listening to them. “It sounds like this timeline is very different indeed from your native history. But, surely, some of the changes were worth it? Your family seem much happier and I know I'm very grateful indeed to be here.”

Marty looked up at Doc, and turned to look at Clara's back for a moment behind him, feeling torn in more ways than one. This Doc, the one before him, had found the great love of his life, and was raising a family with her. So why did he feel so wretched and guilty, like he'd smashed something rare and precious to bits? A thought that had been lurking in the depths of his subconscious like a mythological sea monster suddenly breached the surface of his conscious mind, gelling in an instant like the bolt of lighting that had sent him out of 1955.

“Doc... I... the problem is... You know, I don't think I actually _changed_ anything. Did I? I remember things that never happened, except they did happen, Doc. You're the scientist, you tell me – can you really _change_ time, or.. or is it something else completely?”

Doc blustered a moment, trying to understand Marty's scattered and incoherent statements. “Well, Marty, uh, obviously things are _quite_ different, so based on simple observation, it stands to reason that you _can_ change history. We're here, aren't we? You saw the photos changing in 1955 and 1885. The ripple effect can take some time to catch up, certainly, and it--”

“--clearly never reached me Doc, and you know it!” Marty stood up and began pacing, growing increasingly agitated and frustrated that the smartest man he knew wasn't getting it. “I didn't _change_ time, Doc, I think I just split in half, just cut it down the middle and stumbled down the wrong half, and... and...” Marty paused, pulling at his hair for a moment. His eyes stung and he blinked back against threatening tears. He looked up at Doc, who was staring back at him with a tight expression. “I tried to save my best friend, but he's still dead, isn't he? He bled out on that asphalt months ago, and there never really was a single goddamned thing I could do about it, time machine or no time machine, was there? The man who took me in when I was ten years old, who was more a father to me than my own father was... I just ran away and let him die.”

Marty turned away, leaning into a corner between the wall and a shelf. He felt scrubbed raw inside. He'd known this all along, deep down. He wasn't the Marty who belonged here. This isn't his family, and this isn't his Doc Brown. “I'm just a stranger here,” he whispered more to himself than anyone else in the room. Marty wrapped his arms around himself, wishing he were somewhere else.

Marty stiffened when Doc appeared behind him, pulling at him gently toward the sofa, but after a moment, he gave in and found himself wedged between Doc & Clara, the latter's soft hand rubbing soothing circles into his shoulders while he struggled not to cry in front of them. “You know the worst thing? They might have been awful sometimes, my family, but they deserved to _exist_ just as much as anyone else... hell, maybe they still do, just not where I can see them anymore.” A couple traitorous hot tears escaped and Marty wiped them away quickly, hoping they weren't seen. He felt weak and foolish, spouting this insane nonsense at a man who understood time far more than he himself ever would. He braced himself for Doc's usual “ _You're not thinking fourth-dimensionally_ ” admonishment, but it never came.

“Marty... I... I don't really know what to tell you. There's Hugh Everett's 'Many Worlds' interpretation, of course, but...” Doc paused, clearing his throat noisily before continuing, “Marty, I'm afraid I don't have any certain answers for you. I honestly cannot tell you how or where or why this other version of me which you recall so clearly lived or died, but... I _am_ deeply sorry for how difficult all of this has turned out for you.”

Marty sucked in several deep breaths, shuddering as he let them out again. He allowed Clara to wrap an arm around him and press a soft kiss onto his forehead, and felt some of the anxiety that he'd been holding in for months begin to slowly bleed out of him, just a little. “It's alright, Doc. None of this is your fault. If anything, it's mostly mine. You tried to tell me to be careful in 1955, but I wasn't, and one stupid decision to push George McFly away from a car... and then there was that damned sports almanac. Well, it is what it is. Or maybe it is what it isn't, I really don't even know anymore, but the Delorean is nothing but scrap and I'm not going near that steam engine for all the money in the world, no offense, Doc. Unless you can find a sure-fire way to send me home, I think I'm done with time travel...”

All three of them sat in silence for a moment, the quiet broken only by the ticking of the clocks and the distant sound of Jules and Verne chasing each other out back. “Send you home? Hmm, what a thought that is... For what it is worth, Marty, if you had not made such mistakes, I wouldn't be sitting here to debate the physics and metaphysics of time travel. And my boys out there wouldn't exist. Maybe I'm not precisely your Doc Brown, but you are still my good friend Marty McFly, whatever differences there may be in our memories.”

Marty squirmed at Doc's sudden confession, quite unused to him being so openly emotional. Clara, who had been silent in this conversation so far, gave his shoulder another squeeze. “And you are part of this family as long as I have anything to say in the matter, Marty. I haven't known you as long as Emmett – even _this_ Emmett – but we both owe you a great deal. It's getting quite late, though, and you should rest. I'll find you a blanket, and you can stay on the couch tonight, hmm? I'm sure things will look better in the morning, they usually do, I find.”

* * *

Marty slept deeply and, for the first time in months, dreamlessly, for several hours. He woke up only when the light of dawn seeped in through the windows high on the opposite wall. He could hear Clara and Doc puttering about in the kitchen, but he was in no hurry to get up yet, and rolled over against the back of the sofa to shield his eyes from the sun's rays. Voices from the kitchen floated over him as he drifted in and out of consciousness, and he later wondered if it had been real or something he'd dreamed.

“ _I simply don't know what to do, Clara. He acts like I've died, but I'm still right here, even if my memories are a bit different. I just hate this feeling I keep getting that he resents me, somehow. If I can just get him to see that... Well, time can be rather strange when taken as a whole phenomenon, to be sure, but-” “Emmett, try to be patient with him, will you? We can't all think as fourth-dimensionally as you can, and this isn't a problem of mathematics for him. Marty is mourning something, that much is as obvious as the nose on your face. And I think perhaps he has a right to, if what he said last night is what he truly remembers. It may not have been real for you, but it was for him, and the boy has lost something dear to him, even if you can't see it. I mean, my gosh, I think if I'd seen someone who'd practically raised me from the age of ten gunned down in the middle of the night, I might take a while to get over it, too! And maybe that man was you, in a way, but in another way, that man very much wasn't you. Marty has to come to terms with that in his own way, and what he needs from you right now certainly isn't an argument over the finer points of reality.” “Oh, you're probably right, Clara, as usual.”_

Marty was woken sometime later by Verne shaking him violently by the shoulder and shouting at him that breakfast was on the table.

* * *

Marty ran back and forth, trying to double-check that everything was packed and accounted for. The rest of his band mates had brought their own gear, but he didn't trust them not to forget something important. He'd known them too long to be that naive, especially at seven-thirty in the morning, but then, he'd been the one to insist on getting an early start.

The band had scraped enough money together to buy a secondhand Park-n-Fly airport shuttle van and fix it up, but it really was going to be a squeeze with all their gear included. It would have to do, though. They had six months before they were due in the recording studio on a brand new recording contract, and in the meantime their new management had secured several dates opening for a variety of big-name acts up and down the east coast. Marty had never been past the Mississippi River in his life, and now he had his chance to see something of the nation beyond California's borders. And who knows, maybe they'd eventually tour in other countries, if this album sold well enough.

“You'll call me every night, right?”

“ _Yes_ , mom. I already promised you, didn't I? We'll be pretty busy, but I'll try to find a pay phone where I can, okay?” Marty submitted to another one of his mother's crushing hugs. It wasn't so bad, really, when he thought about it. Maybe the mother he'd grown up with had been too deep into depression and far too deep into her cups to show him this sort of affection most of the time, but even that Lorraine had, deep down, loved her son. His father stepped forward and gave him that awkward sort of half-hug-and-shoulder-pat typical of most men. Marty rolled his eyes where his father couldn't see, then stepped back and shook his dad's hand as he was given George McFly's blessing to go out into the world. If his father's eyes were a little watery, well, it was probably just the breeze after all.

The rest of the band piled into the back of the Park-n-Fly as Marty climbed into the driver's seat and cranked the engine. He'd yelled at his band mates about not smoking weed in the van once already, and did so again when he heard the not-so-clandestine click of a disposable lighter. “Anyway, I have one more stop to make before we hit the interstate, you can smoke that shit in a motel room later if you absolutely have to, but I swear, if I smell it in here, I'm kicking all you assholes out on the roadside and starting my career as a solo artist.”

Marty settled back in the driver's seat and put the van in reverse gear, pulling out of his parents' driveway while they waved at him, misty-eyed. Marty and Jennifer had said their goodbyes the night before, with promises to meet again as soon as possible. He'd been lucky to catch her on spring break before he had to leave - he'd seen her only sporadically since she'd started college, but their relationship had, against his father's warnings that high school romances don't _always_ work out, weathered the separation well. He'd begun to open up to her a little about his experience with the Delorean. She'd seen just enough first-hand to not instantly think he'd lost his mind, at least. He drove down to the stop sign at the end of his street and turned not toward the highway, but toward one last stop in this town before beginning the second great adventure of his life.

* * *

Marty left the engine running in front of Doc's garage so the air conditioner would run for the rest of the boys. It was still spring, but it was turning out to be a hotter than average one and sweat was already beading up on his forehead by the time he'd walked around Doc's garage to find him sitting with Clara in lawn chairs with glasses of lemonade, supervising the construction crew busy building their new house.

“How's it coming along, Doc?”

“Marty! Good to see you. It should be finished by the time you get back from the east, I think. You'll have to drop by and let me give you the grand tour! I'll have to wait for the contractor to clear out before I can finish my own modifications, of course, but I left plenty of space in the blueprints for the additions.”

“Modifications? Do I really even want to know?”

“Oh, it's nothing dangerous, Marty! I wouldn't have anything risky around the boys, after all.”

“You know I have the strongest recollection of someone who looked an awful lot like you saying something almost exactly like that to me when I was twelve, right before setting my hair on fire.” Marty glanced over at Clara, who winked at him and continued sipping her lemonade. “Anyway, how are Jules and Verne liking school in 1986?”

“Oh, they're still studying at home with Clara for the time being, I'm afraid. They're rather advanced for their age, but it will take some time to get them enrolled... I'll have to do something about their birth certificates, at least. Clara and I have tutored them ourselves for years, they'll be fine. Still, I think it will good for them to have children their own age to socialize with. We lived rather off the beaten path in back in the 19th century, and they didn't have much opportunity to make friends.”

“You're not worried they'll spill the beans about their past?”

Doc chuckled. “No, not really. And even if they do, people will likely put it down to the imagination of youth. They've learned the story they're supposed to tell, it's up to them to stick to it unless they want to be known for being as batty as their old man.”

Clara picked up the now-empty pitcher of lemonade and headed back indoors, leaving Marty alone with Doc. _She does that on purpose_ , he thought.

“She'll be a while, I think, if you would like to sit down for a minute.”

Marty hesitated, but sat after a moment. “I can't stay too long, I left the van running with the rest of the band in the back.”

“Well, I won't keep you too long then. This is it, then? Your big plans? Do let me know how it goes.”

Marty snorted. “I've already had my arm twisted off by my mother about calling every day. I suppose I'll have to pencil you in somewhere.”

Doc pulled his hat off and used it to fan himself for a moment, the heat of the day already beginning to build up despite only being mid-morning. “If you run into trouble, let me know. I'll find a way to get to you.”

Marty nodded, watching the construction work carrying on in front of him. “Uh... I'll keep that in mind. We'll really only be gone for about two and a half months, and a lot of that is just going to be driving. Then we'll have a break for uh, another three months I think? We'll probably do more local stuff before we have to head down to L.A. to start recording. After that, well, who knows? We'll be doing the promotion circuit for a while – radio station interviews and more gigs, I think, from what the label guy has told me. If the record sells, shit, we might even be able to make second one, Doc! What do you think of that?”

“Sounds like you have it all planned out, then. I do hope it all goes as you intend, Marty.”

“All I can do is put the work in, the rest is up to luck, I suppose.” Marty got up again, shuffling a bit in hesitation. He needed to get back to the van and on the road, they had a schedule to meet after all, and a cross-country drive was never as simple as it ought to be. Even taking turns driving and sleeping, they'd still have to stop for food and gas, and at least one oil change, so it would take days to reach their first gig in New York. “Well, Doc, I gotta run. It'll be a few weeks, but I'll be back in town before you know it. I'll look forward to seeing the house when it's done, right?”

“Of course, Marty. Best of luck to you, of course.”

Doc smiled and offered a handshake, much like Marty's father had, but Marty ignored it and pulled Doc into a hug instead, holding him tightly for a moment like he had in 1955. He was more sure, this time, that he'd see Doc again in the not-so-distant future, but as his friend had once said, the future is not yet written, and who could say what it would ultimately bring? Doc squeezed him back just as tight after a moment's hesitation, letting go only when he heard the door hinge squeal behind them as Clara returned.

“Going on your way, Marty? The boys and I expect a postcard or two, you know! Don't let us down, alright?”

Marty got another quick hug from Clara, promising her he'd send Jules & Verne a postcard from every city he stopped in, if he could manage it, and headed back to the van. A plume of foul-smelling smoke curled into the morning air when he opened the door.

“What took you so long, asshole? We thought you'd gotten lost!”

“Oh, shut up, Lee, we're leaving now. And don't think I can't smell that shit you're smoking back there. You'd better put it out or I'll come back there and put it out in your ear. We've got a long drive and all of you are gonna have to take a turn behind the wheel eventually. This is our big break, we can't afford to screw it up with dumb mistakes, like getting high and wrecking the van before we even get over there, alright?”

Maybe nothing would entirely make sense, maybe his world had morphed into something he would never fully recognize, but everything really _had_ worked out, in the end. Marty pulled the van out of Doc's driveway, pointing it out of the neighborhood he'd spent his whole life in, whatever the decade was. He hit the interstate a few minutes later, driving into the rising sun.

**Author's Note:**

> This story is partly inspired by "If Only" by ThePreciousHeart here on Ao3. There were a few avenues her story didn't cover that I wanted to amble down, so here we are I guess. It seems like something of a rite-of-passage to do a post-BttF3 fic in this tiny fandom anyway, so why fight the tide?
> 
> Also, yes, the title is taken from that Salvador Dali painting of the melting watches. It kinda matched Marty's mood for most of this fic, so there.


End file.
